Canadian carriers Air Transat and Sunwing Airlines both started to resume flights on 30 July after temporarily shuttering their operations amid restrictions on international and domestic travel aimed at halting the spread of Covid-19. Both leisure carriers began flights to Punta Cana, Mexico, as part of their initial service to cater to Canadians eager for travel to sun destinations. Ottawa in January negotiated with Canada's airline sector to halt flights to the Caribbean, Central America and South America. Sunwing's initial schedule includes routes from Toronto to Cancun, Punta Cana and Montego Bay; and from Montreal to Cancun and Punta Cana. Transat began service with flights from Montreal to Punta Cana and Vancouver. Canada's third-largest airline says it will operate 24 routes to 16 destinations during the summer season. Transat starting in November plans to operate a network of 50 destinations in the Caribbean, Mexico, Central and South America, the USA and Europe. WestJet and Air Canada during August will continue reintroducing routes and launching new ones. Porter Airlines is also recalling its staff and plans to restart flights on 8 September as international borders open to vaccinated travellers. The Toronto-based regional carrier shuttered its operations during the pandemic as local and federal travel restrictions in Canada damaged travel demand. Travel demand to Mexico has been relatively strong during the pandemic and trade group Airlines for America (A4A) notes that it was the top international travel destination for Americans throughout 2020. Ottawa plans to resume non-essential travel by vaccinated people arriving from the USA starting 9 August and will welcome vaccinated travellers from all nations starting 7 September. The USA, meanwhile, plans to keep travel restrictions in place for arrivals from other nations as the contagious delta variant of Covid-19 drives a spike of infections around the world. Canada's federal government is backing this airline restart by providing carriers with loans, including the C$270 million ($216 million) provided to Porter through the Canada Enterprise Emergency Funding Corporation (CEEFC). WestJet is the only major carrier in Canada that has declined federal loans, in part because it is owned by private equity firm Onex Partners. Ottawa during 2020 provided federal wage subsidies to companies impacted by the pandemic but not airline-specific financing on the scale of the USA or France.

Air New Zealand carried 901,000 passengers in June, a 150% increase year-on-year. The airline increased capacity, as measured in available seat-kilometres, by 141%, while the month's revenue passenger-kilometres was up by 165%, it says in a 2 August filing to New Zealand's Exchange. Passenger load factor improved 6.1 percentage points to 65%. On domestic routes, the carrier carried 787,000 passengers, up 132% year-on-year, whereas Tasman/Pacific routes saw an increase of 667% to 109,000 passengers. Capacity on domestic routes was increased by 107%, while revenue-passenger-kilometres rose 139%. For its Tasman/Pacific network, Air New Zealand increased capacity by over 551% and RPKs increased by 735%. Passenger load factor on domestic routes grew 10 percentage points to 78%, while the load factor on Tasman/Pacific routes gained nearly 14 percentage points to over 63%. The airline carried 5,000 passengers on long-haul routes, declining by 35% year-on-year.

Qantas Group will roll out IATA’s Travel Pass digital health application when regular international flights return. “We want to get our international flights back in the air and our people back to work and a digital health pass will be a key part of that,” Qantas Group chief customer officer, Stephanie Tully says in a statement today. “A digital health pass will connect customers with Covid testing facilities, health authorities and airlines, and ultimately enable the opening of more travel bubbles and borders.” Tully says Qantas is working with IATA to develop the application to make the process “as seamless as possible” for travellers as international borders start to reopen. The group says final development is now underway to ensure the application is ready for use on Qantas and Jetstar international flights when they resume. Many countries where Qantas and Jetstar operate to have announced requirements of either a proof of vaccine or negative Covid-19 test result to enter without quarantine, Qantas Group says, including the UK, Canada and USA. “IATA Travel Pass delivers an advantage over other solutions in that the app enables travellers to create a digital ID derived from a government-issued document such as a passport,” Nick Careen, IATA’s senior vice-president for operations, safety and security says in the same statement. “This means that airlines and governments can have full confidence in the test/vaccine results both from a content and identity perspective.”